What Is and What Will Be
by wandertogondor
Summary: Dean tries to distance himself from Sam and their younger sister Rachel to protect them but a trip to the future makes him realize that it could be one of his biggest mistakes yet. Set in Season 5, "The End." Co-written by SPNxBookworm!
1. Chapter 1

"Who was that?" Rachel caught sight of her older brother pocketing his phone as she stepped out of the bathroom.

"Cas."

She sniggered, falling into the closest bed and sitting up against the headboard. "He's a bit clingy, don't you think?"

"Get some sleep." Dean walked over to ruffle her hair, sitting on the edge of his own bed, burying his face in his hands. "We need to be up bright and early in the morning."

"You can stop acting now," Rachel leaned over to put a calm, reassuring hand on his knee. "Stop acting like you're taking everything in stride, Dean."

Without a word, he threw his legs over the bed and reached up to turn off the lamp that sat on the stand between the two beds. "Like I said," he said coldly. "get some sleep, Rach."

Rachel sighed as she settled into her own bed. She knew that Dean was barely keeping it together. She was just trying to help, to be a source of comfort for him as he had been for her all these years. Trying not to let it bother her, she soon drifted off into dreamland.

Sometime during the night, Rachel was brought out of her sleep by the piercing sound of Dean's phone vibrating on the nightstand. She was just about to reach to press a random button to turn it off but her older brother was there before she could pull her hand out from the warm covers.

"So, what, you're just gonna walk back in and we're gonna be the dynamic duo again?"

She must have drifted back into sleep but the skepticism in Dean's voice made her alert and she reached her head farther out to hear more clearly. The voice patterns from the phone speaker were barely discernible but Rachel knew Sam's voice no matter what.

"Look, Sam—it doesn't matter—whatever we do. I mean, it turns out that you and me, we're the, uh, the fire and the oil of the Armageddon. You know, on that basis alone, we should just pick a hemisphere. Stay away from each other for good."

"Dean, it does not have to be like can fight it," Rachel heard Sam faintly speak through the phone when Dean neared her bed.

"Yeah, you're right. We can. But not together. We're not stronger when we're together, Sam. I think we're weaker. Because whatever we have between us—love, family, whatever it is—they are always gonna use it against us. And you know that. Yeah, we're better off apart. We got a better chance of dodging Lucifer and Michael and this whole damn thing, if we just go our own ways...Bye Sam."

A thought crept into Rachel's mind. It was small, almost insignificant. Dean was talking about how he and Sam were so dangerously codependent on each other that one day that love and all those aspects of filial piety would backfire. It would come back just to bite them in the ass and Dean didn't want it to come back and swallow Sam up whole because he just couldn't do that to his little brother. It was a small thought but spoke volumes to Rachel as she buried herself deeper in the microfiber blanket, wiping her rising tears with the soft material until she faded into another bout of sleep.

Dean sat in the chair beside the window, watching the rise and fall of his baby sister's body as she peacefully slept. He couldn't love himself, therefore he thought he couldn't possibly be capable of loving her. She was his blood, his flesh, and his family. He talked a good deal about family to push Sam further away but he still had to keep Rachel at a distance to keep her safe too. She wasn't ready to go out and hunt by herself yet. She was just a kid and he was mother and father to her now - no longer an older brother with a clear job strictly restricted to teasing and being kind and comforting her when she cried. He needed to tell her no pointblank; he needed to tell her that she wasn't ready or that it was too dangerous. An older brother was supposed to make their little sisters feel safe even when danger was apparent. But their current situation didn't permit that. Dean's heart broke as he thought about it. He had to straight out tell her that she was in danger and there was only so much he could do to keep her in one piece.

All he could do was do. He couldn't tell.

He couldn't tell her how much he loved her or how much he wanted to keep her out of heaven's plan or hell's wrath. Dean wanted to wrap her up in a fire proof blanket and keep her tucked away safe and sound.

His eyes fluttered closed to sight of a comforting motel room where his little sister was safe and innocent. And his eyes fluttered open to a rotting motel room where she was nowhere in sight. Dean sprang up out of the groaning chair in surprise, his head poking out of the window to see the streets, the buildings, the entire city destroyed.

"Rachel?" He called out of the window, staring up and down the deserted streets before starting down the nearly leveled motel outside, his voice still calling out one name. "Rachel?"

**XXX**

Dean couldn't believe his eyes as he stood outside the motel building; gazing at what was now ruins of abandoned buildings, broken and trashed vehicles and probably dead people. He didn't want to think about that. It seemed as though a hurricane had flown through here, or worse.

The distant sound of something like glass smashing made Dean turn towards the source and he cautiously made his way towards it to investigate. He finally crossed an alley and spotted the first sign of life. He felt a little relieved. He saw what looked like a little girl clutching a teddy bear. He slowly started making his way towards her.

"Little girl? Little girl?" Dean called out, frowning when she didn't answer. "Are you hurt?" he asked. Still not receiving an answer, he smiled nervously. "You know the not-talking thing is kind of creepy, right?"

Suddenly the girl looked up at Dean, blood dripping from her mouth. Before Dean could react, she was charging towards him, brandishing a shard of glass. He managed to flatten her and that's when his gaze fell on the graffiti decorating the wall to the side of him.

**CROATOAN**, it read.

"Oh crap," Dean muttered as he spotted a large number of people round the corner into the alley. With only one look at them, he knew that they were already infected with the deadly virus. He didn't allow himself to give a second thought as he sprinted out of the alley, all the while dodging and jumping over rubble and dirt.

He ended up being blocked by a chain linked fence. He hurriedly climbed over it, retreating into an alley on the other side, gaining cover from the croatoans momentarily before breaking through yet another chain linked fence on the other side of the alley and out of the affected hotspot. He eyed the board attached to fence post which said,

**CROATOAN VIRUS**

**HOT ZONE**

**NO ENTRY**

**BY ORDER OF ACTING REGIONAL COMMAND**

**AUGUST 1, 2014**

**KANSAS CITY**

Dean frowned as he read and reread the board. "August first, 2014," He was in twenty– fourteen? How the hell did he end up here?

Looking around, he spotted a car and hurriedly walked up, grinned in success as he successfully managed to hot-wire it. Getting in, he started down the littered road driving into the oncoming darkness. Dean grumbled under his breath as he pulled out his phone only to realize that there was no cell service. He resorted to turning on the radio. It only gave off static.

"That's never a good sign." He rolled his eyes and muttered, nearly jumping out of his skin when Zachariah popped up in the seat next to him, holding a newspaper and reading from it.

"Croatoan pandemic reaches Australia."

Glaring at Zachariah, Dean snapped unhappily, "I thought I smelled your stink on this_ Back to the Future_ crap."

Zachariah ignored him as he continued to read from the paper, "'_President Palin defends bombing of Houston._' Certainly a buyer's market in real estate. Let's see what's happening in sports. That's right—no more sports. Congress revoked the right to group assembly. What's left of Congress, that is. Hardly a quorum, if you ask me."

Dean had had enough of Zachariah's signature beating around the bush act. "How did you find me?"

"Afraid we had to tap some unorthodox resources of late—human informants. We've been making inspirational visits to the fringier Christian groups. They've been given your image, told to keep an eye out," Zachariah explained indifferently.

Dean groaned. "The Bible freak outside the motel—he, what, dropped a dime on me?"

Zachariah nodded in amusement, pumping his fist in the air. "Onward, Christian soldiers."

"Okay, well, good, great." The hunter threw out sarcastically. " You have had your jollies. Now send me back, you son of a bitch." He would always deny it, but he was terrified. Sam and Rachel, both were nowhere to be seen yet. This was anything but good and he needed to get back. He at least needed to locate them just to know they were safe.

"Oh, you'll get back—all in good time. We want you to marinate a bit,"

Dean looked confused and pissed off as he countered, "Marinate?"

"Three days, Dean. Three days to see where this course of action takes you," Zachariah chanted, looking overly cheerful for a angelic being who was in the middle of a war.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means that your choices have consequences. This is what happens to the world if you continue to say 'no' to Michael. Have a little look-see in Chitaqua," Zachariah quipped and, before Dean could say anymore, vanished leaving Dean to his thoughts; thoughts that were anything but hopeful.

Dean soon stood outside Camp Chitaqua. He was careful to dodge the men that were patrolling around the area as he snuck inside the camp, picking the lock on the perimeter fences. Making his way further into the darkness, his eyes caught sight of the Impala, now wrecked, rusted, and beaten to her frames. "Oh, baby, no," he said, shocked, and hurried over to the car, a look of dismay on his face. "Oh, no, baby, what did they do to you?"

A twig snapped close behind him, and Dean barely had time to look before something hard struck him against his head and a white light flashed in his eyes before black invaded his vision.

"Are _you_ dead?"

A faintly familiar voice broke Dean out of his hazy state. He lifted his head slowly, wary of his stiff neck, and squinted against the light that seemed to overpower the small room he was in. "Rachel?" He began to move his arm and briskly sat up when he found his wrist handcuffed to a ladder.

"He speaks!" Her voice cackled in a darker, more indifferent drawl then Dean remembered. "Gotta hand it to you Dean, you didn't age very well."

"Shut up!"

The young woman curled her expressions and made a face at her older brother, rolling her eyes and throwing her AK-47 on the table where he sat cleaning his own gun. Dean stared at the older version of himself from the floor of the cabin before tearing his eyes toward his sister. Her hair was longer and her face was so much colder than he remembered. It was like all the innocence and kindness that once made her so much more beautiful was now sucked from her body.

"What the hell?" He gasped under his breath, watching when his older self stood and approached where he sat with heavy footsteps.

"I should be asking that question, don't you think? In fact, why don't you give me one good reason why I shouldn't gank you right here and now?" The line between his eyes were deeper and a shadow seemed to shadow his face as he stuck his finger into Dean's face.

"Because you'd only be hurting yourself," Dean replied, trying to lighten the moment.

His older self feigned a sardonic smile. "Very funny."

Dean held out his free hand cautiously, trying to approach the subject with the right words. "Look, man—I'm no shapeshifter or demon or anything, okay?"

"Yeah, I know." He squatted on his ankles, motioning back to Rachel with a quick wave of his hand. "We did the drill while you were out. Silver, salt, holy water—nothing. But you know what was funny? Was that you had every hidden lockpick, box cutter, and switchblade that I carry. Now, you want to explain that? Oh, and the, uh, resemblance, while you're at it?"

Rachel stifled an amused snort from ways behind them, crossing her arms and kicking out one leg, ready for a good answer.

"Zachariah."

"Come again?" Dean's face hardened, his shoulders squared at hearing the angel's name again.

"I'm you from the tail end of 2009." Dean explained, trying to sound as truthful as he could even though he didn't need to try so hard. "Zach plucked me from my bed and threw me five years into the future."

"Where is he? I want to talk to him," demanded his older self.

"I don't know." Dean shrugged. "Look, I just want to get back to my own friggin' year, okay?"

"Okay. If you're me, then tell me something only I would know."

Dean thought for a moment before a wide smirk drew on his lips. "Rhonda Hurley. We were, uh, nineteen. She made us try on her panties. They were pink. And satiny. And you know what? We kind of liked it."

"Ew," Rachel echoed from where she stood, grimacing at the very thought. She'd rather not have heard that.

"So, what, Zach zapped you up here to see how bad it gets?"

"I guess. Croatoan virus, right? That's their endgame?" Dean tried adjusting himself with the discomfort of being handcuffed.

"It's efficient, it's incurable, and it's scary as hell. Turns people into monsters. Started hitting the major cities about two years ago. World really went in the crapper after that," Dean told his younger self grimly.

"What about Sam?"

His older self went still. "Heavyweight showdown in Detroit. From what I understand, Sam didn't make it."

Dean's eyes expanded slightly in disbelief. "You weren't with him?"

"No. No, me and Sam, we haven't talked in—hell, five years."

"We never tried to find him?"

"We had other people to worry about." He straightened his dirty coat and stood straight, obviously trying to tell himself that his answer was justifiable and started to gather his weapons into a duffel.

"Where you goin'?" Dean craned his neck to see what he was putting into the duffel.

Looking up, his older version pointedly said, "I got to run an errand."

"You're just gonna leave me here?"

"No, of course not. Rachel'll give you company. I got a camp full of twitchy trauma survivors out there with an apocalypse hanging over their head. The last thing they need to see is a version of The Parent Trap. So, yeah, you stay locked down."

"Okay. All right. Fine. But you don't have to cuff me, man. Oh, come on. You don't trust yourself?"

He stopped at the open door, barely looking back to answer. "No. Absolutely not."

"Dick." Dean growled as the door slammed shut and Rachel walked forward.

"Oh, good, you see it too." She pulled out a paper clip from her pocket and squatted beside him to work on the handcuffs.

"Didn't he - I - Didn't we tell you to guard me?"

Rachel almost laughed in his face at his choice of words. "I don't give a shit what he says. You and I aren't exactly sympathico anymore."

"What happened?"

She shrugged lightheartedly still picking at the lock. "Life. You were too busy always putting Sam first. Both of you treated me like I was baggage keeping you from doing the things you wanted to do. And I tried so hard to be there for you, Dean. Remember that one night at that sleazy motel? That night Sam called you and you shut him down. I tried to help you and you kept pushing me away and treating me like I was a child. And one day I just stopped caring. So, now," Rachel lifted her arms to motion around her. "This is what happened. You don't exactly get better. We barely talk anymore. Which is fine, you weren't exactly brother of the year in the first place."

Before Dean could even begin to make up for his actions, Rachel was halfway out the door. He struggled to catch up to her speed but was stopped short when Chuck approached him, the prophets nose stuck in a clipboard.

"Hey, Dean. You got a second?"

Dean froze. "No—yes. Uh, I—I guess. Hi, Chuck."

"Hi. So, uh, listen, we're pretty good on canned goods for now, but we're down to next to nothing on perishables and—and hygiene supplies. People are not gonna be happy about this." He looked up. "So, what do you think we should do?"

"I—I don't know. Maybe, uh, share? You know, like at a kibbutz."

Rachel walked back from behind a cabin just as Chuck said, "Wait a minute. aren't you supposed to be out on a mission right now?"

"Absolutely." Dean quickly stood at his little sister's side, feeling out of place anywhere else. "And I will be."

"Uh-oh." Chuck shared a look with Rachel at the woman who angrily came up to them, trying to throw a slug at Dean.

"Whoa! Jeez! Easy, lady!" Dean ducked and hid behind his sister, who stood rooted to the ground.

"Oh, hi, Risa," Rachel greeted over-enthusiastically, pretending to be interested in why she was pissed. "What happened today? Did you chip a nail?"

"Shut your whore mouth, Winchester." Risa sneered before turning to attack Dean. "You spent the night in Jane's cabin last night, didn't you?!"

"Uh, what? I—I don't—did I?" He looked at Chuck and his sister who nodded together.

"I thought we had a 'connection'."

Dean managed his best smile. "Well, I'm sure that we do."

Without another word, but just large, frustrated expressions, Risa strutted away. Leaving Rachel grinning ear to ear, and Dean with his mouth hanging open.

"Oh, jeez. I'm getting busted for stuff I haven't even done yet."

"Hey, Risa!" Rachel called out and once Risa turned, hands on hips, she said, "You look lovely! It must have taken you all day! Just remember to keep all that shit off your face before you bang my brother again."

"Since when did you start giving a damn about your brother, huh?" Risa briskly walked back, ready for a fight.

"Since he started sleeping with trash like you." Rachel easily replied, blocking Risa's quick left hook with her forearm and bringing the heel of her palm against the other woman's nose, drawing blood almost immediately. "Oh, no!" She sarcastically drawled. "Better get your pretty nose put back in place before you get blood on that tacky jacket. Chuck'll help you."

Chuck threw her a frightened look, gently instructing Risa to lean her head back before leading her toward a cluster of cabins nearby.

"Why would you do that?" Dean blanched.

"I like 2009 you better, and I hate that bitch. Breaking her nose was on my bucket list anyway." She cracked a smile. "Wanna go see your boyfriend?"

"My what?"

"Cas."

"Is...Cas still here?"

"Yeah!" Rachel motioned her head toward another cabin. "I don't think he's going anywhere."

They walked up the steps of a cabin, Rachel going through the beaded curtain first and gesturing Dean to follow suit. Cas was sitting in a circle with several women hanging to his every word, fawning and grinning.

"So, in this way. We're each a fragment of total perception—just, uh, one compartment in that dragonfly eye of group mind. Now, the key to this total, shared perception—it's, um, it's surprisingly physical." Castiel caught Rachel's eye before his concentration turned to Dean. "Oh. Excuse me, ladies. I think I need to confer with our fearless leader for a minute. Why not go get washed up for the orgy?"

Dean caught his sister's wrist just as she was about to follow the rest of the women, glaring the smug smile off her face.

"Future you wouldn't give a shit." She mentioned.

"Well, I'm not future me yet." He hissed back. "And you're not getting washed up for any orgy...ever! Not while I'm still kicking."

"They're all so beautiful." Cas stood before the two Winchester's, grunting in exhaustion as he stretched his back.

Dean looked him over, noticing the disheveled hair and the bare feet. "What are you, a hippie?"

Cas simply smiled. "I thought you'd gotten over trying to label me."

"Clearly an absence of judgement," The youngest Winchester threw in, leaning on the door frame while her brother squared himself with Castiel.

"Cas, we got to talk."

"Whoa. Strange," Cas said, his eyes widening.

"What?"

With a slight squint, Cas continued. "You...are not you. Not now you, anyway."

"No! Yeah. Yes, exactly!"

"What year are you from?"

"2009."

"Back when he wasn't as big of an asshole." Rachel added in helpfully as she crossed her arms.

"Who did this to you? Was it Zachariah?"

Dean nodded grimly.

"Interesting," the former angel mused.

"Oh, yeah, it's friggin' fascinating," Dean snapped sarcastically. "Now. Why don't you strap on your angel wings and fly me back to my page on the calendar?"

"I wish I could just, uh, strap on my wings, but I'm sorry, no dice."

"What," Dean judgmentally tilted his head. "are you stoned?

"Uh, generally, yeah." Cas replied.

"We're all generally stoned nowadays, brother dear." Rachel let out a rippling laugh and rubbed his back reassuringly.

"What happened to you?" Dean demanded. "Both of you!?"

Cas looked between the two Winchester's and answered what anyone else would have said,

"Life."


	2. Chapter 2

There are situations where you know what emotion you're feeling and exactly how you would behave because you're you and you like to think that you know yourself better than anyone else. But then there are instances that come up where you don't even know what to say or how the hell to react.

That was exactly Dean Winchester's dilemma as his eyes went back and forth between Rachel and Cas, the former angel. He couldn't understand what had gone so horribly wrong that Castiel was now not only almost human, but also a drug addict and an 'orgy' specialist, and his sister had become an empty shell of what she used to be.

Dean remembered her as quirky, sarcastic, funny and someone who actually gave a shit as to what happened to the world around her. The Rachel standing in front of him didn't even seem to bother. She was too eager to avoid conflict and just cruise the Apocalypse out. It was this that petrified Dean, making him wonder yet again what had gone so horribly wrong with his future self and his sister in just five years.

Before the older Winchester could organize his thoughts, however, a rumble outside the cabin alerted him. Rachel also seemed to go on high alert at the sudden break in the silence and, before Dean knew it, he was being shoved out the door and nearly dragged halfway back to the cabin when a pealing gunshot cut through the air.

Dean whirled around to see his older self, lower a pistol, eyes staring right at him and Rachel. She cursed under her breath from behind him at the sight of the body of a fellow camp member lay in a bloodied heap by the parked jeep. Before Rachel could say a word of warning, her brother was advancing on them, eyes blazing.

"You let him out, didn't you?" Her older brother looked between Rachel and his doppelganger. "Didn't you." he repeated, sternly eyeing his sister.

It wasn't a question anymore because he knew it was Rachel pulling one of her half-assed stunts for kicks.

"Whoops." The snarl in her reply wasn't entirely hidden by the drawl of sarcasm.

Dean seemed to look wary as he shoved his younger self back into his cabin. He had spent too much energy trying to lead people who were basically ducks sitting on the front line. His tired eyes followed his younger sister as she leaned silently against the far wall, clinging to the shadows like she'd been so used to doing in the last five years. The loss of Sam had hit her hard. Almost breaking her down entirely. But somehow she had managed to build herself back up into a carefree hippie who couldn't give two shits about the greater good. She didn't even seem to miss Sam anymore because he was just the freak brother that no one talked about. She didn't care that Sam was gone and she just didn't care. That's what he resented about her the most. She just didn't _care_ and she didn't _try_.

"Ground control to Major Dick. Ground control to Major Dick!" Rachel was waving her hands in the air trying to get his attention. "Why'd you kill Yeager? Your less douchey self wants to know."

"We were in an open quarantine zone," he promptly explained. "Got ambushed by some Croats on the way out. Yeager got infected, took one for the team."

"How decent of him," Rachel muttered under her breath, eyes rolling almost iconically with a sudden smirk curling up. "Fatass got his just desserts."

"How do you know?" Dean asked, surprised that his supposed younger sister didn't even look a little disturbed at what just happened.

The older Dean got defensive almost instantaneously. "'Cause after a few years of this, we know. I started seeing symptoms about a half an hour ago. Wasn't gonna be long before he flipped. I didn't see the point in troubling a good man with bad news."

Dean was horror struck. How could he have become this heartless in five years? How could his sister not seem to care?

"'Troubling a good man'? You just blew him away in front of your own people. Don't you think that freaked them out a little bit?" he argued weakly, knowing that putting his dukes up wouldn't do anyone much good.

His twin scoffed from the table where he sat with his legs propped up. "It's 2014. Plugging some Croat, it's called commonplace."

"All right, look—" Dean tried to explain but was cut off.

"No, you look. This isn't your time. It's mine. You don't make the decisions. I do." He then approached his sister with a deep frown etched into his face. "So, when I tell you to stay in, you stay in."

Dean raised his hands in surrender. "All right, man. I'm sorry. Look, I—I'm not trying to mess you—me—us up here," he said, knowing it sounded just as screwed up as he felt.

Rachel held her brother's line of sight, undaunted. "This is not the time for you to belly ache because I hurt your feelings. We have bigger fish, Dean."

The other Dean sighed and replied with a deep-throated, "I know." He pulled out a bottle of whiskey and two glasses, filling them before handing one to his clone, leaving his sister out because she was still a thirteen year old in his head.

"It's just been a really wacky weekend," Dean said, taking the glass.

For a slight second, Dean could see a little bit of light at the humor in his older self's eyes as he chuckled and said, "Tell me about it."

They drank in silence with Rachel humming under her breath to herself, looking out the window as if she was waiting for something incredible to happen. It wasn't a tune Dean recognized so maybe she picked it up from somewhere over the years. It still terrified him how just done with it she seemed.

"What was the mission anyway?" He finally asked, setting down his glass to focus wholly on his darker reflection.

In answer, the older Dean pulled out a gun out of his coat and laid it across the table top with a thunk. Rachel let out an audible sigh of relief. She had been waiting for this moment longer than she could possibly admit. The sudden jolt of pure joy at the very sight of the Colt made her chest ache in anticipation.

Dean's eyes widened. "The Colt?" he asked, dumbstruck and half-inclined to reach across the table to take it in his hands.

"The Colt."

Dean pressed his hands against the table to keep from grabbing the Colt, self-constraint wasn't his golden quality. "Where was it?"

His doppelganger shrugged. "Everywhere. They've been moving it around. Took me five years, but...I finally got it. And tonight — tonight, I'm gonna kill the devil."

Rachel started across the room toward the door but her brother caught her forearm with a tight grip. His younger version widened his eyes at the harsh exchange but waited to see how it played out in silence.

"Where the hell do you think you're going?"

She pulled out of his grip. "I was going to get Cas. You know he wanted in on wasting Lucifer. And he can help us pinpoint the exact location."

"No. We don't have to find Lucifer because we know where he is. The demon that we caught last week, he was one of the big guy's entourage. He knew."

Dean raised his eyebrows skeptically. "So, a demon tells you where Satan's gonna be, and you just believe it?"

"Demons," Rachel pulled the chair from out under her brother's legs, much to his irritation, and sat down to talk to her preferred version of Dean. "Nowadays, have smaller brains and bigger egos. They think they got this war in the bag tied up with pretty silk ribbons just because they got Lucifer to chug out orders. They're weak."

"Trust me," the other threw in with a dark undertone. "He wasn't lying."

"And you know this how?"

"Our fearless leader," Rachel took the glass of whiskey from her brother's hand and continued, with the brim of the glass prepared to meet her lip. "Is all too well schooled in the art of getting to the truth."

"Torture? Oh, so, we're—we're torturing again." He was answered with an annoyed look. "No, that's—that's good. Classy."

Rachel snorted with amusement and ignored the condescending look that was now adjusted to meet her attention. "What? I like past you. You used to be funny. Can you even physically laugh now?"

Unfolding a map from his coat pocket and ignoring the hurt that came with her words, the older Dean grimly spread it out on the table for the other two get a clear look. He put his finger down on a point in the center of the hot zone and said,

"Lucifer is here. Now. I know the block and I know the building."

"Oh, good," Rachel exclaimed as she adjusted her eyes to the layout of the map. "It's conveniently located in the middle of nowhere. And crawling with Croats. I guess I can sleep easy tonight knowing that you really thought this through, Dean."

"You saying my plan is reckless?"

"Are you saying we walk in straight up the driveway, past all the demons and the Croats, and we shoot the devil?" She countered like it was second nature and a card she could just play with him.

"Yes."

Dean sat back and watched them going at each other. They seemed normal now, whatever that word meant in the present situation, but despite the almost self-destructive attitude both future him and future Rachel had going for them; a part of them still clicked with the fact that they were still family. They fought but they'd be loyal to each other no matter what.

"Okay, if you don't like, uh, 'reckless', I could use 'insouciant', maybe. I'd even settle on 'down-right retarded'. Does that sound good?"

"Oh, shut up, Rach. You _are _coming, right?"

"I'm your second in command. Of course I'm coming, idiot. But why is he? I mean, he's you five years ago. If something happens to him, you're gone, right?" Her eyes wandered over to where Dean sat idly watching, staying out of sight and out of mind, enjoying their childish squabbling because it was a welcome relief to the harshness.

He couldn't conceive it.

His older likeness stood straight with his shoulders squared. "He's coming."

"Okay." She complied as she swallowed a murky taste of bile from her throat and stood. "Well, uh, I'll get the grunts moving."

"Just us. I want us loaded and moving by midnight."

"Why are you taking me?" Dean now stood to get involved, just catching the sharp look Rachel threw at him. It wasn't far from evil but he dismissed it as a glint of the eye, not bothering to dwell on it for long.

"Relax. You'll be fine. Zach's looking after you, right?"

"No, that's not what I mean. I want to know what's going on. So humor me."

"Yeah, okay, I'll square with you. You're coming because I want you to see something. I want you to see our brother."

"Sam? I thought he was dead."

"Sam didn't die in Detroit. He said 'yes'."

There was a long silence. And even Rachel stopped shoving ammo into a duffel to watch the cogs in the younger Dean's head working on overtime.

"That's right." Her brother nodded to confirm the younger Dean's fears. "The big 'yes'. To the devil. Lucifer's wearing Sammy to the prom."

"And what a pretty dress it is." Rachel chimed in like it was just a big joke. But the thing is, you can't say the same joke twice.

"Why would he do that?" Dean asked, shock coursing through him. In the world he'd left behind thanks to a dick-headed angel, he and Sam had agreed on one thing: never saying 'yes'. He couldn't understand what would have happened that would have made Sam agree to possibly ending the world with just his consent.

"Wish I knew. But now we don't have a choice. It's in him, and it's not getting out. And we've got to kill him, Dean. And you need to see it—the whole damn thing, how bad it gets—so you can do it different." He caught a magazine filled with shiny new bullets that his sister threw and pocketed it. "When you get back home—you say 'yes'. You hear me? Say 'yes' to Michael."

"That's crazy. If I let him in, then Michael fights the devil. The battle's gonna torch half the planet."

"Look around you, man. Half the planet's better than no planet, which is what we have now. If I could do it over again, I'd say 'yes' in a heartbeat. And before you bitch and ask me why I haven't it's because I've tried! I've shouted 'yes' till I was blue in the face! The angels aren't listening! They just—left—gave up! It's too late for me, but for you — "

"Oh, no. There's got to be another way," Dean almost pleaded. He couldn't just be selfish and let half the planet get wasted. What in his right mind was his clone thinking?!

"Yeah, that's what I thought. I was cocky. Never actually thought I'd lose. But I was wrong, Dean. I was wrong. I'm begging you. Say yes...but you won't. 'Cause I didn't. Because that's just not us, is it? Look at Rachel. Look at her real hard because she's like this because of us."

Rachel paused her working hands under their scrutiny.

"We used to think we could hold our own. First it was unhooking Sam and we both secretly knew she was bound to be next. You know that, I knew that. Before it was all about making sure Sam didn't get caught in the crossfire but then it was about her. And we didn't care in the end! If not for the planet and if not for our damn ego, then do it for her because we never put her first. Kept treating her like dead weight."

*****SUPERNATURAL*****

"So," Dean began, momentarily glancing at the side mirror to make sure his older self was following close behind, before turning back to Rachel who drove the truck. "Anything I should know about 2014?"

She raised one shoulder with a laugh. "If you wanted free advice you should have gone to Chuck. He doles it out and never shuts up. He'd tell you to hoard toilet paper. 'Hoard it like it's made of gold.'" Rachel grinned ear to ear at her own impersonation of the prophet.

"Yeah, but what would _you_ say? You gonna tell me to start wiping my own ass or start being a good brother?"

"You were a good brother. I'm still alive, aren't I? Which means you still are a good brother regardless of what you tell Michael. Don't let him bully you." She paused as if to concentrate on getting the truck over a rut. "Dean thinks I don't care about what happens. And he's right. I don't care. Couldn't give a flying shit about Risa or Yeager or Chuck. Not even Cas. It was always about you and Sam. Dad made sure to get that in my head before he died. It wasn't the whole 'Simple Man' shit with our old man, was it?"

Dean chuckled and shook his head in agreement. "No, it wasn't."

"Just do one thing for me when and if you get back."

"Yeah, anything."

"Call Sam and take him up on his offer when you can because when he's gone, he'll be gone forever. If things go according to plan tonight, I will have to watch him leave me twice. And that's not something I can swallow."

"Rachel..."

"For me." She insisted in earnest. "The last five years haven't been what you'd call ideal. Not for me and especially not for you."

"Was I _that _bad?" A fear started of creep in the back of his mind which was further encouraged when she nodded solemnly. "I'm sorry."

"You barely noticed me between the bar surfing and the hunts. Not that I'm complaining too much." A childish grin brightened her face despite the darkness that seemed to swallow the truck whole. "You have no idea how much fun I had while you disappeared for hours on end."

Dean's matching smile fell and realization turned his face into one of dreaded curiosity. "Fun? Like what kind of fun? Like, staying up for a Clint Eastwood marathon kind of fun or...?"

"I got into the booze a few times. Passed out in the bathtub once."

"Oh that's not too bad. At least you didn't have guys over."

Rachel snorted. "You're on board for me to be a raging alcoholic but god forbid I have _sex_! That's just going _too _far!" she mocked, chuckling. Dean would be Dean. Even her own brother riding in the truck behind them would have given the same reaction as the one next to her did. The only difference was that the Dean driving behind them would be irritatingly passive-aggressive about it.

Dean braced his arm against the dashboard to catch himself from jolting right off the truck. "You know I'm trying right? I'm trying to balance it all out. Being brother, mom, and dad to you."

"We had a mom and we had a dad. It's not your place to fill, Dean."

"I wanted to protect you."

"I know, and you have." Rachel nearly implored because she wanted him to know that his efforts weren't in vain. She was going to continue but Dean turned his gaze on the road, resuming silence, and a little bit of regret started pulling at the hooks attached to her soul at what he was going to see. Because it'd be more than just the devil.


	3. Chapter 3

**SPNxBookworm: Hey everyone! Thank you to all who followed, favourited, reviewed, and read this. This was a first time writing with the amazingly talented wandertogondor and I had a splendid time! I do look forward to hopefully writing more with her in the future! :) **

* * *

Rachel gently shut the door to the truck, careful not to wake the younger Dean from his well-deserved sleep. She leaned against the bed of the truck as her older brother walked up, map in hand. He motioned to her with a silent tilt of his head to come back to join him while he began unfolding the map. Tucking her fingers into the pockets of her faded jeans, Rachel slowly took a few steps closer, trying to kick out the knots in her legs from driving for so long in such a constrained space.

"What's up?" She asked, coming up beside him and squinting over his shoulder at the map which was barely discernible under the faint light of the rising sun. "We're still a good two miles from the hot zone."

Dean folded up the map without a word and turned to square his body with hers. His facial features were stern, contemplative but his voice faltered. "Rachel." His eyes immediately searched for something else to look at. "I - "

"Don't." She stopped him instead and wrapped her arms around his neck, bringing him in close and trying her best to hide her tears into the curve of his shoulder. "We're going to get out of this, Dean. We're going to get out of this alive. Just like we've gotten out of every rut for the last five years. Please don't give me that dewy-eyed crap. Now not. Not when we have to be strong."

He held her tightly, not trusting himself to say more without sounding like an idiot. He knew he'd screwed up everything with his little sister. He couldn't apologize for being so hard on her and for neglecting her and for making her carry him when he was the one who should have been carrying her when times got hard.

"I'm sorry, Rachel," Dean said, determined to make at least one amend before everything went to Hell, literally and figuratively.

Her grip around his neck tightened momentarily as if to say _don't you dare start._

"Rachel," he pulled back far enough so he could meet her eyes. "I want you to pick the winning side, okay? If things get hairy, I want you to pick the winning side. Do what you have to do to stay alive, hear me?"

"Stop talking like you're about to die."

"Promise me." Dean held her face between his hands, forcing her eyes to stay glued to his. "Promise me right now."

She nodded but didn't say it out loud. Couldn't. She knew she was already on the winning side. Promising him wouldn't make it any less real.

"You ready?" Her older brother asked, stepping further away toward his own truck. He seemed genuinely concerned.

Rachel feigned a confident grin. "Are you?"

His face was grim but he nodded nonetheless.

Climbing back into the drivers seat of the truck, Rachel was surprised to find that the younger Dean was sitting up, awake. He didn't say a word to her as she started up the engine and geared the vehicle into drive. He held onto the handle near the top of the door, eyes staring into the dim wooded forest before them.

"Did you sleep well?" Rachel finally resorted on asking.

Dean replied with nothing more than a slight nod.

She ran her tongue across the front of her teeth, trying to think of comforting words to say to him, something that she wished he would've said to her when she was younger. "I know you're scared, Dean. And that's okay because I am too. This is the first time I'm going to see Sam in over five years."

"It's not Sam anymore."

"You still got me." Rachel threw him a dazzling smile, hoping he'd share one of his own.

He didn't.

And somehow, it physically seemed to hurt her. It's like she was losing Dean all over again.

She continued. "There's no place where the light of heaven won't get to you. But you can run. You can run as long and as hard as you want but they _will_ find you. And when they do, Dean - when you do go back to your own year - I'll be right behind you."

"Thanks, kid." He replied without much gratitude.

Rachel didn't press him for more. It was clear that he was worried and dreaded seeing Sam. She understood his anxiety. The knot at the bottom of her stomach wasn't gentle and wasn't planning on letting up anytime soon either. A large chunk of her conscious wished she could turn the truck around and hide bunkered down in the hole in the woods that was Camp Chitaqua.

But she couldn't resort to that because she was too involved. Had been for five years now. It hadn't happened purposely. She had just tried her hand at a few witchy tricks and it had worked out better than expected.

She had got to talk to Sam one last time.

*****SUPERNATURAL*****

"This is it." Rachel dismissed, slinging her heavy duffel bag into the bed of her truck and pulling out a handgun, ejecting the clip, then tossing it toward her older brother who came toward her and his younger self with his own duffel.

"This is it." He repeated and caught the magazine clip with one hand.

The roof of the Jackson County Sanitarium could barely be seen through the density of trees that towered high above the three hunters. While the older Dean did a quick one-over through the crevices of the Colt, Rachel sighed as the warm morning light hummed in, sinking into her shoulders. The air smelt like Christmas and Easter and Halloween all combined. It smelt sweet.

"Hey," The older version of her brother waved his hand in front of her face while his stunt double watched from a distance. "Rachel! You ready?"

"What?" She blinked, jolting out of her thoughts. Yeah. Sure thing."

"Good." Dean kissed her forehead and pushed past her toward the Sanitarium, gun poised in the crook of his arm.

They stalked silently closer to the building with their weapons loaded. The air was damp from the rain and the only sound in the silence was of their footsteps under the moist ground.

"There." The older Dean crouched behind a small bush, pulling his sister beside him, and pointed. "Second-floor window. I'll head through the back while you barrel through the front."

"She can't go through the front!" the younger Dean protested. "Take a look around you, man. This place should be white-hot with Croats. Where are they? They cleared a path for us. Which means that this is - "

"A trap." Rachel finished.

"Well, then you can't go through the front." Dean continued before his mouth fell open at how serious her expressions became. "You mean you're gonna feed yourself into a meat grinder? You want to use your death as a diversion?" He turned to his doppelganger, outraged that this was actually happening. "You're really on board with this?"

The older Dean looked away, half-ashamed, as soon as he felt his sister's eyes land on him.

"Oh, man, something is broken in you. You're making decisions that I would never make. I wouldn't sacrifice my own family."

_That's funny_, Rachel scoffed inwardly, _that's exactly what you did to Sam._

"Dean," She put her hands up, trying to settle him down. "I want to do this. We need to kill the devil and save the world and that's exactly what I'm trusting both of you to do."

"No. Not like this, you're not. I'm not gonna let you." He went on with his opposition but was cut short when Rachel's fist struck sharply across his jaw, successfully knocking him unconscious.

"I better see you on the other side, brother." She stood and said to her conscious brother. Without further delay, she cocked her gun, and took a step closer to the building while watching him pull out the Colt. There was a smile on her face like she knew that she was going to die. She'd be stupid to think she wouldn't. "And when I do, I'll make sure to pin you down so many times that you'll be coughing carpet fuzz."

"I'll be looking forward to it, kid."

With a final nod, Rachel sprinted into the building, guns blazing.

She had never run so fast in her life. Not when she sprinted out of that motel room when Dean had had a breakdown. Not when she had dragged him out of Detroit after Sam took the fall. Not when he had left her for dead in the middle of the red zone.

Not even when her brother had actually stopped being a brother at some point.

Rachel had never run so fast in her entire life.

*****SUPERNATURAL*****

Dean woke up to gunfire and lightning and thunder. Neither of which he wanted to hear when he'd just been knocked out by his sister who was so willing to throw her life away like she had nothing to lose. He hauled himself to his feet and was about to run into the front entrance of the building when a bone-chilling shriek came from the back of the building.

Dean had never run so fast in his entire life.

The lightning was sudden and pierced into Dean's eyes as he stopped dead in his tracks in the center of a garden. He saw the older version of himself on the grass, neck held down by someone wearing a white shoe. There was a brief moment when his older self opened his eyes to look right into Dean's eyes before the white-clad figure shifted his weight. The sound of the neck breaking was sickeningly audible.

"Oh. Hello, Dean." There was a smile in the words, and more clearly, a smile on Lucifer's face when he turned to face Dean. "Aren't you a surprise. You've come a long way to see this, haven't you?"

Lucifer took a few choice steps forward, still smiling.

"Well, go ahead. Kill me." Dean growled through clenched teeth, trying to avoid looking at what essentially was his own dead body.

"Kill you?" was the amused reply. "Don't you think that would be a little...redundant?"

Lucifer sighed with remorse. "I'm sorry. It must be painful, speaking to me in this - shape. But it had to be your brother. It had to be."

He reached for Dean's shoulder but Dean moved back, fist clenched.

"You don't have to be afraid of me, Dean. What do you think I'm going to do?"

"I don't know." Dean shrugged, talking to Lucifer's back as he gravitated toward a rose bush. "Maybe deep-fry the planet?" Dean snapped, resorting to his long used sarcasm as a means of dealing with whatever was going on here. Dean knew he was barely keeping it together, especially since it was Sam he was looking at.

His Sammy.

His little brother that was probably screaming somewhere inside his own head, too weak to overpower the Devil on his own.

Dean was jerked from his thoughts as Lucifer spoke.

"Why?" Lucifer questioned, turning away from examining the rose to look straight at Dean. "Why would I want to destroy this stunning thing? Beautiful in a trillion different ways. The last perfect handiwork of God." He then seemed to ponder over a thought for a few seconds before asking, "you ever hear the story of how I fell from grace?"

"Oh, good God," was Dean's sharp remark. "you're not gonna tell me a bedtime story, are you? My stomach's almost out of bile."

Lucifer smiled at Dean with pity in his eyes. "I should have expected so much from you. Your sister was always more understanding. She understood what it's like. Always sat down and shut up for just a few minutes to talk to me. She loved you. She loved you more than anything. Just liked I loved God." He shrugged dismissively. "But you're only human, right? You let her down...Used her for every penny she owned and just left her for me to put her back together. And she _loves_ me for it. She _loves_ me for killing you."

"Shut up."

"But it was always about Sammy, wasn't it, Dean? It's funny how both your siblings gave up on you in the end. It's funny how they both came to my side."

Dean didn't respond. Not for a long time. "What are you talking about?" he finally asked, almost dreading the answer.

Lucifer kept his feet rooted to the ground but simply twisted his body to the side, his eyes dancing toward the corner of the garden where Rachel stood under the eaves of a building. Dean's jaw dropped at the sight of her, unscathed and unaffected from the supposed suicide run.

"Don't." She said to him in a voice fainter than a whisper, shaking her head as if she wouldn't have it. "Don't you look at me like that. I chose the winning side. Just like you're gonna tell me to do."

Dean swallowed the pain and the ache that started up in his chest. He pushed it all down hoping that this wasn't true. He almost hated himself for wishing that his sister was lying dead in a pool of her own blood rather than standing alive before him. But it was true. He'd rather have her dead than siding with Lucifer. He lost his brother to hell, he couldn't lose her too. Not like this. So, turning back to Satan, Dean finally spoke.

"You're not fooling me, you know that? With this sympathy-for-the-devil crap. I know what you are."

"What am I?" Lucifer asked with a wide smirk, looking almost genuinely curious.

"You're the same thing, only bigger. The same brand of cockroach I've been squashing my whole life. An ugly, evil, belly-to-the-ground, supernatural piece of crap. The only difference between them and you is the size of your ego."

"I like you, Dean." Lucifer turned to walk toward Rachel before stopping. "I get what the other angels see in you. Goodbye. We'll meet again soon."

"You better kill me now!" Dean bellowed like it was a challenge. "You better kill me now. Or I swear, I will find a way to kill you. And I won't stop."

"I know you won't. I know you won't say yes to Michael, either. And I know you won't kill Sam. Whatever you do, you will always end up here. Whatever choices you make, whatever details you alter, we will always end up," Lucifer waved a hand around the garden, "Here. I win. So, I win."

Dean clenched and unclenched his fist, eyes skipping between Lucifer and his sister. "You're wrong."

Lucifer put one hand up and flicked his wrist to the side. Rachel's neck snapped to the side and she collapsed into the healthy green grass, bone splintering out through her neck.

Dean didn't realize he was screaming until Rachel dropped lifelessly to the ground, eyes still open with the shock and pain resonating through them.

"See you in five years, Dean." And Lucifer disappeared within the boom of thunder and the flash of lightning.

Dean was halfway to sprinting to his sister's side when Zachariah appeared between them and put two of his fingers against Dean's forehead.

Before he knew it, Dean was bracing himself against the kitchenette in the motel room. His eyes searched through the room to rest finally on Rachel. She was curled on the bed like a question mark. Zachariah watched on eagerly as Dean's eyes stayed on her.

"You saw it, right?" Zachariah wondered rhetorically. "You saw what happens. You're the only person who can prove the devil wrong. Just say yes. The time for tricks is over. Give yourself to Michael. Say yes and we can strike. Before Lucifer gets to Sam. Before your sister dies. It's over for you, but it doesn't have to be over for her."

Dean wasn't paying attention. He knew right from wrong and he knew when his mind was made up. He wasn't going to say yes. Rachel shifted under the bed sheets and she slowly lifted the sheets. Dean's eyes widened at the sight of blood smeared across the sheets and her clothes and oozing out of her skin. She stood, eyes focused only on him.

Even Zachariah was displaced as he watched her open the door to the bathroom with her blood covered hand. His eyes widened at the banishing sigil that was drawn in her blood on the other side of the door. There was a smile on her face directed at her older brother when she slammed her bloodied hand on the sigil.

"Hi," she smiled in greeting once Zachariah had vanished, cheery and bright-faced like nothing had happened.

There was no smile on Dean's face. Instead he nearly ran forward to wrap his arms around her. He felt the blood from her arms sink through his shirt but it didn't matter to him at that moment. He wanted to remove the image of his dead sister out of his head. He fought back the sudden tears threatening to overflow as he convinced himself that Rachel was here. That she was alive.

Rachel coughed for air at the force of his hug.

"Uh, Dean? I can't breath."

"That's okay," he replied with a short laugh, loosening his arms around her midriff. "you don't need to breath."

"You feeling better now?" Rachel pulled away from his embrace and stood back, trying absently to wipe her blood from his clothes. "Quit looking at me like that, you weirdo."

"Like what?" Dean inquired through a smile.

She gave him a look as if to let him know that he was finally going insane, blindly slapping at her clothes in an attempt to brush the blood off. "I hope that two-faced douche chokes on the fumes of his own bile."

"Hold that thought." He put a finger up to stop her and fished for his cell phone. "Go take a shower. We're heading out in five."

"Are you calling Sam?"

"Shh," Dean put hand over Rachel's entire face and shoved her into the bathroom, averting back to the phone call when Sam answered. "Uh, hey, Sammy. It's me."

"I knew it!" came Rachel's hushed voice from the other side of the bathroom door.

Balling his hand into his fist, Dean banged on the door, trying to focus on the script that was formulating in his mind. "How about we - I - we take you up on your offer, huh?"

"We?"

Dean could almost see the scowl on Sam's face. "Yes, Sam. 'We' as in me and Rachel. Rachel? Our sister?"

"Yeah, I got it, dumbass." Sam snapped. "You just never mentioned her being in it with us."

"She's our kid sister." Dean started to pace across the span of the room, waving his hands in the air as if he was trying to convince himself as well as Sam. "I've seen things, man. Trust me."

"What made you change your mind?"

"Long story. The point is...maybe we are each other's Achilles heel. Maybe they'll find a way to use us against each other, I don't know. I just know we're all we've got. More than that. Me, you, Rachel? We keep each other human."

"Thank you. Really." Sam sighed out in relief and gratitude. "Thank you. I won't let you down."

"Oh, I know it. I mean, you are the third-best hunter on the planet." Dean bemusedly tossed his things into his duffel.

"Third-best?"

"Once I'm done with her," There was a smile that split Dean's face in two. "Rach's gonna almost be as good as me."

"Put her on the phone for me?" Sam requested.

"She's a bit busy at the moment. We'll see you in a couple of hours though, sound good?"

"Who was that?" Rachel caught sight of her older brother pocketing his phone as she stepped out of the bathroom, all cleaned up.

Dean grinned back at her, elated to see her happy and healthy and alive, and lied, "Cas." But it took him a moment to realize that her gray-green eyes smiled when her mouth didn't. "What?"

She took a few deep breaths, bustling throughout the motel room for a few minutes before finally standing in front of him while he sat on the bed. "What did Zachariah mean when he said that you have to give yourself to Michael before I die?"

Placing a comforting hand on her cheek, Dean dismissed the question with just a smile. He was racking his brain for some faulty excuse to give her instead of the truth but he couldn't lie to her. Not after what after he had just seen. "At what point will the little bird pop out of your head and start singing?"

There was that smile he was waiting for!

"Shut up, Dean," she shoved him back a little in opposition. "Are we gonna go now?"

"Go where?"

That earned him another playful shove.

"To go see Sam! I know you weren't talking to Cas. Come on! Let's get a move on already!"

Dean watched while she excitedly got into her shoes and her jacket and stood at the door, ready to go. _Yeah_, he thought, I_ can change this. I can keep her alive. That little spitfire ain't gonna die as long as I'm around. No way that gonna happen on my watch._ Lifting his own duffel, Dean nodded over and over again in agreement to his thoughts as he followed her out the door and down to the registration office to check out.

He _would_ stop it.

Even if it killed him.


End file.
